Irina Rodnina

Russian lawmaker and former Olympic figure skating champion

“I’m just saying they [Americans] wouldn’t report to us. Look at the amount of abuse those children were subjected to. I am not saying that it happened everywhere. But there were a lot of cases like that. We weren’t notified about them because the child would lose their citizenship.”

Russian lawmaker Irina Rodnina’s statement justifying the Russian ban on U.S. adoptions overstates instances of abuse of adoptees in the U.S., ignores Russia’s own lack of accountability in inter-country adoptions and misstates laws in Russia and the U.S. governing citizenship.

RT

Russian state-funded news channel

"If you’re a Russian immigrant in the United States — or anywhere else — don’t bother tweeting your opinions unless your English is flawless. Otherwise you’ll be branded a Kremlin-paid troll by influential American think tanks."

Grammar mistakes common to Russian-speakers are only a small part of Nimmo’s article, which gives readers a list of several factors to look at when trying to determine whether an account is fake. RT’s writer either did not read the full article or deliberately misrepresented its content.

Alvi Karimov, press secretary of Ramzan Kadyrov, head of Chechnya

Alvi Karimov, press secretary of Ramzan Kadyrov, head of Chechnya

“There is not even a grain of truth in it. Attempts were made by certain forces, through bribery, promises of visas and residence permits in Europe, to persuade young people to make statements about being affiliated with gays and being persecuted for that. The topic of gays is only part of a large-scale information and psychological attack being carried out against Chechnya by organizations financed by the U.S. government and international organizations sponsored by Western intelligence agencies. In Chechnya, men have only one orientation, and its impact is evidenced by the highest birth rate in the country.”

Karimov’s statement does not align with numerous reports reflected in the Amnesty International’s annual report on the declining rights of the Chechen gays (p. 312, “Rights of Lesbian, Gay,….”) but copies earlier statements made to Vladimir Putin by Ramzan Kadyrov denying existence of any gays in Chechnya.

Maria Zakharova

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson

“The fur coat is Russian; I bought it at the Ladya (National Crafts) Exhibition at the World Trade Center (Moscow) this year. The shoes are by the firm Vitacci -- a Russian company of Russian-Italian manufacturing. I wear OURS – either what was made completely in Russia or by the order of a Russian company.”

Vladimir Putin

President of the Russian Federation

“Why do we seem to have vocal and proactive opposition members in this country but they do not really provide any serious competition to the incumbent authorities? You know, Russia’s path in the past decades has been quite remarkable, to put it mildly. Why is that? Of course, some younger people do not remember or do not even know what was happening here in the 1990s and the early 2000s. So they cannot really compare it to the present situation.”

Putin explains that the reason he faces no serious rivals for the presidency is due to the accomplishments of Russia during his tenure, and implies that the opposition has no program. However, both domestic and foreign analyses of the past 17 years say that Russia’s accomplishments have been largely negated thanks to Putin’s own policies. There also are domestic political reasons why Putin’s rivals are weakened, which he does not mention.

FARA registration does not ban, limit or censor media content; it merely requires transparency and public disclosure. It is false to assert that RT is facing exceptional pressure in the U.S., since multiple nations have probed RT for breaking journalistic codes and standards, and some have even banned it.

Dmitry Peskov

press secretary for Russian President

”This is not about any kind of censorship. But, of course, in providing grants, the state has the right to designate certain topics that are of particular interest to the state. But to call this some kind of manifestation of censorship would be wrong."

President Vladimir Putin and his press secretary Dmitry Peskov insist that the arrest of a famed director Kirill Serebrennikov has nothing to do with politics or censorship. The involvement of the FSB’s 2nd Service calls their claim into question.

RT

Russian government-funded international broadcaster

“Afghan military are suspected of molesting minors. However, a public acknowledgement of this fact would mean a rupture of the U.S. relationship with Kabul. But Washington has invested about $700 billion in the Afghan campaign over the last 15 years and is not ready to lose its investments."

Tatyana Moskalkova

Russia's human rights ombudsman

“Four times fewer Russian citizens are going to the European Criminal Court [sic]. Because today the European court doesn’t meet our ideas of justice. It takes a long time to consider things, selectively.”

Sputnik

The Kremlin-funded international broadcaster Sputnik reported that the governor of Nevada declared a state of emergency over the state’s shortage of marijuana supplies. In fact, no state of emergency was ordered in Nevada.

Vladimir Putin

President, Russia

“Moscow is among the world leaders in the use of digital technologies in modern urban infrastructure, ahead of such mega-cities like Toronto, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Barcelona and Sydney. By the way, in certain aspects of the index, Moscow is among the top three: digital services in the interactions between the state and the citizens – actually first place, simply first place in the world. The creation of infrastructure for the implementation of innovative solutions: according this criterion, Moscow takes second place in the world. The development of new business models based on the mass adoption of advanced technologies – third place; and an education system that meets the needs of the labor market of the future – also third place.”

Russia’s president praised Moscow for earning the top three positions among the world’s “data driven” mega-cities in an assessment made by the Moscow branch of the PricewaterhouseCoopers consulting company. The fact that PwC-Russia has an ongoing long-term contract with the Russian government raises questions about the independence and objectivity of this assessment.